the person with the banner, thanks for setting the upbeat tone for the day!

[Risso]

definitely helped set the atmosphere for the game amongst the fans!
what it should have said is lets get behind the team and help them get inspiration from us! but the fecker with the issue started the ball rolling down hill!
You may think your way was right to boo and call for the managers head whilst the game was going on, i like to call you treacherous basterds for deserting the TEAM!

My way?  What are you talking about, my way?

And deserting the team?  How do you know that the person who put the banner up didn't support the team the same as everybody else?  Not wanting Houllier as manager is bugger all to do with supporting the team or not.

[rutski]

I expect there'll be more than 1 banner for Newcastle if we lose at Goodison
I'm on holiday thank the lord

good fan!

definitely helped set the atmosphere for the game amongst the fans!
what it should have said is lets get behind the team and help them get inspiration from us! but the fecker with the issue started the ball rolling down hill!
You may think your way was right to boo and call for the managers head whilst the game was going on, i like to call you treacherous basterds for deserting the TEAM!

My way?  What are you talking about, my way?

And deserting the team?  How do you know that the person who put the banner up didn't support the team the same as everybody else?  Not wanting Houllier as manager is bugger all to do with supporting the team or not.

ok, do you think the booing and the barracking helped the team one little bit?

[Risso]

Do you think putting Gabby on the wing helped the team one little bit?  Fans aren't robots, in your simple world of make believe, fans who have paid a fortune to watch a whole season of shit might sing and chant even when the team are crap and the manager clearly a moron, but real life isn't like that.

[rutski]

Do you think putting Gabby on the wing helped the team one little bit?  Fans aren't robots, in your simple world of make believe, fans who have paid a fortune to watch a whole season of shit might sing and chant even when the team are crap and the manager clearly a moron, but real life isn't like that.

not once have i said you do not tove the club, not once have i said that their opinion was not worthwhile!
I wear lucky pants, i keep to the same routine, i cheer every tackle by a villa player and every pass! I do everything in my power to be a positive influence on the boys on the pitch! What happened saturday did not help the players one bit and just by saying i dont like the manager does not excuse the fact there were treacherous bastards everywhere in that stadium saturday!

[TonyD]

Do you think putting Gabby on the wing helped the team one little bit?  Fans aren't robots, in your simple world of make believe, fans who have paid a fortune to watch a whole season of shit might sing and chant even when the team are crap and the manager clearly a moron, but real life isn't like that.

not once have i said you do not tove the club, not once have i said that their opinion was not worthwhile!
I wear lucky pants, i keep to the same routine, i cheer every tackle by a villa player and every pass! I do everything in my power to be a positive influence on the boys on the pitch! What happened saturday did not help the players one bit and just by saying i dont like the manager does not excuse the fact there were treacherous bastards everywhere in that stadium saturday!

Oh dear.

[WikiVilla]

treacherous bastards ?
Calm down mate

[Marlon's Hairy Wood]

treacherous bastards ?
Calm down mate

leave it out or it'll be off with your head

[KevinGage]

Does he mean the Liverpool fan in the dugout? He surely does.

He can't mean anyone who paid £30+ to watch that tripe.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

We're not going down, not yet anyway. Everyone needs to get behind the team and that plank winding everyone up with a daft banner gave everyone the wrong message.

Just found the courage to watch the game again and the one thing that really stuck out was just how quiet Villa Park was on Saturday. Despite not having the best of first halves, we weren't that bad, creating two clear cut chances (Carlos and Makoun) that could have seen us go in at half time 2-1 up. Instead the team gets booed off the pitch.

I'm not sure what everybody was expecting; we were lucky in both games last season to get a draw, Wolves are not as bad as some would like us to believe. They came for a point and got three. A bit like us over the last few seasons, relying on the counter attack. They managed to frustrate us and our fans bit. I do wonder if our fans had been a bit more supportive whether we'd have introduced a bit more urgency to our game, something that was clearly missing. At times it felt like watching us in a pre-season friendly.

I just hope that between now and the end of the season the fans get behind the team. They're going to need all the help they can get, what with confidence being so low.

[Chris Smith]

You are right about how quiet it was, Mark. I think there was a collective nervousness that just got worse as the game went on and must have had an impact on players already low on confidence. My thoughts coming out of the ground were that we'd been shit but as you say there were chances that would have lifted the mood considerably. That's what happened against Blackburn, as soon as we scored we were a different side. Perhaps I am clutching at straws but I have to think/hope that we are capable of producing 3 or 4 more  of that type of performance before the end of the season.

[Marlon's Hairy Wood]

Does he mean the Liverpool fan in the dugout? He surely does.

He can't mean anyone who paid £30+ to watch that tripe.

Are you suggesting that G-Hou sneaked into the Holte before the game in order to put the banner up and hopefully get sympathy from the more loyal supporters?

right thats it! i've heard it all now!!

[Rudy Can't Fail]

Having grown up listening to endless anecdotes relating to the glory years of the 70's and how inspirational the Holte has always been, one can only wonder what was on the minds of the Villa 'faithful' yesterday as the events unfolded at VP.

I wholeheartedly embrace the supporter’s right to criticise and voice their disaffection at the pallid, ineffectual performance of our highly paid team but does voicing this disapproval before or during the game help? We played against a team of predominantly cheap, run of the mill players on wages comparable to our youngsters who comfortably did a job on us! A job as directed by their management’s tactics and ably supported by the negative atmosphere created by a vociferous minority of malcontents on the much lauded former terrace. If they are unhappy with Houllier, and even I, as a supporter of his, offer no defence to yesterday’s tacticless debacle, then surely they should express that discontent after the game when it has no affect on the performance?

When you consider the teams we are playing in the run in and their recent experience of relegation battles I fear our disunity will be our greatest Achilles heel. Blues, West Ham, Albion, Wolves and Wigan have all been here before and do we really expect the Blackburn and Blackpool fans to turn on their clubs / teams / managers as we did yesterday? Should we not leave the post mortem to the end of the season? The Chairman played his hand in January and I don’t see what other options we have until we know the outcome of this traumatic campaign.

We told D O'L we weren’t fickle. I am beginning to wonder!

Spot on. Next time I'll read all the thread before posting.

[TopDeck113]

I have to say that the atmosphere on Saturday was one of resignation - and that wasn't the result of one banner being unfurled before kick-off.   

[PeterWithe]

Is it bollocks spot on. So it wasn't the fault of the forty clap a week players but those of us in the stands? The ones who part with their hard to come by cash week after week and are rewarded with a display as gutless as that?

Tripe, if they are big enough to demand wages comparible with the most successful players in the world then they are big enough to listen to us complain when they turn in a perfomance lacking in any sort of desire whatsoever.

[KevinGage]

And a reference to the infamous O'Leary f bomb to underscore it.

Bollocks is right.

I'd advocate a re-introduction of the word filter for that little gem, as anyone still clinging to it is clearly unimaginative enough to come up with alternatives by themselves.